by: Cory Brady

Orville Smith is dealing with the calm before the storm right now. Orville is looking to give the performance of his life on tonight (Oct.10) when he will be in the biggest fight of his young career as he faces off with Matt Jaggers on Showtime’s ShoXC card at the Horseshoe Casino in Hammond, Indiana. At 6-0 and training with a camp that includes UFC veterans Chris Lytle and Jake O’Brien the future is shining bright for Orville. While he knows he’s in the game to one day earn a belt around his waist, Orville is putting that on the back burner for now. He realizes his fight with Jaggers is the first priority and knows it is best to take things one fight at a time.

PRO MMA: How are you feeling right now physically in the hours leading up to your fight?
Orville: I’m feeling pretty good man. Not feeling to bad at all.

PRO MMA: What do you know about your opponent Matt Jaggers and have you had a chance to review his tapes?
Orville: I haven’t seen any video on him. I couldn’t find any. I’ve heard he’s got some good ground and pound and that’s a big part of his game.

PRO MMA: So is the plan going to be to play the wrestling game with him or more to stand and trade?
Orville: I’m going to try to stand up with him as much as I can and see how that goes. If nothing else then I’m pretty good on the ground myself. I have pretty good jiu-jitsu skills so it won’t matter if he does get his takedowns because I feel really good.

PRO MMA: Who have you been training with for this fight?
Orville: I’ve been training with Pat McPherson, Chris Lytle, Jake O’brien, guys like that.

PRO MMA: Are you able to train full time or do you hold down a day job as well?
Orville: No I work a full time job, forty plus hours a week and I try to go to the gym as much as I can and train.

PRO MMA: That’s tough. What do you do?
Orville: I work in a lead refinery.

PRO MMA: How did you get your start in mma?
Orville: I wrestled in high school for like four years and then I graduated and for like four or five years didn’t do anything. I’ve always been kind of a knuckle head and liked to fight so I decided to stop getting in trouble for it and try to do something good with it.

PRO MMA: Your undefeated in your mma career, do you think you will be ready for a title shot pretty soon down the road?
Orville: Yeah, I want to get this fight out of the way before I worry about that. This is the first really big fight that I’ve had so I’m concentrating on this fight and not really thinking about anything else right now.

PRO MMA: This is going to be the biggest fight so far in your career. How important is it that you put on an exciting performance this Friday night?
Orville: Yeah it’s really important. I want to show what I can do and show the world that I can really fight.

PRO MMA: Alright man, before I let you go how about a prediction?
Orville: It’s going to be a great fight.

PRO MMA: Alright Orville thanks for your time and good luck on your fight.
Orville: Thank you.

ShoXC airs tonight on Showtime at 10pm Central/8pm Pacific.

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